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Snowflake Eggs

H

Hurley

Registered
I figured I'd show a pic of my most "snow flaked" eggs of the season. Every year I get a clutch or more of these. Snow flaking is variable in amount and intensity. Never seems to affect incubation or hatching. They do fine.

SnowflakeEggs.jpg




I've tried to find a difference between conditions leading to snowflake eggs versus not and have so far been unsuccessful in isolating the determining factor. Things considered:

Not enough Calcium in diet - All snakes are fed the same diet, not all or even most have snowflakes, no change seen when I tried calcium a few years ago.

Familial - Snowflakes appear from multiple unrelated lines and different morphs

Condition of female - see them in fat, skinny, and inbetweeners. No correlation.

Brumation practices. All snakes brumated under identical conditions.

Husbandry - all setups identical, all schedules identical, water source, food source, etc. identical.

Virgin moms? - Nope, seen with different snakes at different periods, first clutch was not correlated

Just something seen in that snake? - Nope. Some years one snake will lay normal, the next, they may be snowflaked. No rhyme, no reason that I can track.
 
That's JT's Hypo het Lav x Hypo Lav clutch. There's a hypo nose out of camera range off the left side and this little one so far. Looks to be in the darker end of the range. Probably will be a female. :D
 
Hurley said:
That's JT's Hypo het Lav x Hypo Lav clutch. There's a hypo nose out of camera range off the left side and this little one so far. Looks to be in the darker end of the range. Probably will be a female. :D
Click to expand...

LOL, didn't I tell you Hurley?? I'm going to Atlantic City til Sunday, hopefully a nice pink little hypo male will pop out while I'm gone! :crazy02:

Those eggs look wild, I've never seen them like that. Strange you haven't found any common demoninators in there. :shrugs:
 
Thanks for sharing your findings! Three of the four clutches that have already hit the ground this year have snowflaking. I was wondering if it was time to bump up supplementation. Looks like it nothing to worry about too much, those little hatchlings look great!
 
You may try supplementing calcium. I personally had no luck with it. Looking at those snowflakes the first time I had them, I was convinced it was a calcium deficiency. Has to be, right? Well, I just didn't see any changes the next time around with supplementing calcium to some. In fact, I had more snowflakes in the calcium supplemented animals. :shrugs:

One gal this year laid moderately snowflaked eggs for a first clutch. She didn't get really fat by the time she laid a second clutch and looked quite thin following that. ...all 12 second clutch eggs have no snowflaking. I would think if calcium were an issue, that in a snake throwing snowflakes, then not eating that great prior to the second clutch, laying that many, and looking skinny, that she should have snow flaked the heck out of that second clutch. Didn't happen.

I'm curious to hear others' experience with snow flaked eggs.
 
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I wonder if it would have anything to do at all with how long the eggs are carried between prelay shed and actually being layed???
 
Snowflakey eggs

ON that last note mentioned, I just had my hypo het lav female lay her clutch FINALLY. I've been waiting a long while and the eggs I finally got after she acted eggbound for four days are snowflaked on the ones that look good. 21 eggs unless she's decided to pop one or two more out later. The snowflake ones all feel softer then usual. 11 are what I think MIGHT be good. I've pegged the rest as slugs. Some of the eggs already seem to be showing veins. So I have to wonder how long she was actually holding these things. ANd if I should expect the eggs to hatch earlier or not.
 
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